Today on this International Women's Day,
we spend the hour with Wangari Maathai, the first African woman and
first environmentalist to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.

Her life story is
a remarkable one. Wangari Maathai grew up in a rural village in Kenya.
She excelled at school and eventually won a scholarship to attend university
in the United States. After graduating with a degree in biological sciences
she went on to earn a master's degree from the University of Pittsburgh.
In 1971, she received her PhD from the University of Nairobi, making
her the first woman in eastern and central Africa to earn a doctorate.

She then embarked
on what would become a life-long campaign against the government-backed
forest clearances in Kenya. In 1977, she founded the Green Belt Movement
when she planted nine tree seeds in the yard of her house. In the following
years, she succeeded in persuading women across Africa to do the same.
Today, about 30 million trees have been planted across the continent
to fight deforestation.

Throughout her life,
Wangari Maathai has campaigned on issues such as poverty, malnutrition,
corruption, women's low economic status and the lack of media freedom
in Kenya. She has also criticized the negative images of Africa in the
Western media and the reluctance of rich countries to relieve Africa's
debt. [includes rush transcript]

Kenya's former president,
Daniel arap Moi, once called her a "mad woman," and "a
threat to the order and security of the country." Over the years,
she has been arrested several times for her environmental campaigning.

In 1989, she forced
the government to abandon plans to build a skyscraper to house party
headquarters on public land. In 1992, she was beaten unconscious by
police during a hunger strike. In 1999, she was whipped on the head
and arrested while trying to plant saplings to replace trees felled
by property developers. She caught the nation's attention when she insisted
on signing the police report with the blood from her head.

She tried to run
for president in 1997 but her candidacy was cancelled on a technicality.
After Moi's party lost a presidential election in 2002, she was elected
to parliament and is now deputy environment minister on Kenya.

Last year, the Nobel
committee named her the winner of the 2004 Nobel Peace prize saying,
"Peace on Earth depends on our ability to secure our living environment."
She received the award in December at a ceremony in Oslo.

AMY GOODMAN: Wangari
Maathai received the award at a ceremony in Oslo.

WANGARI MAATHAI:
As the first African woman to receive this prize, I accept it on behalf
of the people of Kenya and Africa and indeed the whole world. I am especially
mindful of women and girl-child. I hope to encourage them to raise their
voices and take more space for leadership. I know the honor also gives
a deep sense of pride to our men, both old and young. As a mother, I
appreciate the inspiration this brings to the youth I urge them to use
it to pursue their dreams. Although this prize comes to me, it acknowledges
the work of countless individuals and groups across the world. They
work quietly and often without recognition to protect the environment,
promote democracy, defend human rights and ensure equality between women
and men. By so doing, they plant the seeds of peace. I know they too
are proud today. To all who feel represented by this prize I say use
it to advance your mission, and meet with the high expectations the
world will place on all of us. This honor is also for my family, friends,
partners and supporters throughout the world. All of them helped shape
the vision and sustain the work which was often accomplished under hostile
conditions. I'm also grateful to the people of Kenya who remained stubbornly
hopeful that democracy could be realized and the environment managed
sustainably. Because of this support, I'm here today to accept this
great honor. I am immensely privileged to join my fellow African Peace
Laureates, President Nelson Mandela and F.W. de Klerk, Archbishop Desmond
Tutu, the late Chief Albert Lutuli, the late Anwar al-Sadat and the
U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan. I know that African people everywhere
are encouraged by this news. My fellow Africans, as we embrace this
recognition let us use it to intensify our commitment to our people
to reduce conflicts and poverty and thereby improve the quality of life
of our people. Let us embrace democratic governance, protect human rights
and protect our environment. Im confident that we shall rise to
the occasion. I have always believed that solutions to most of our problems
will have to come from us. In this year's prize the Norwegian Nobel
Committee has placed the critical issue of environment and its linkage
to democracy and peace before the world. For their visionary actions
Im profoundly grateful. Recognizing that sustainable development,
democracy and peace are indivisible is an idea whose time has come.

AMY GOODMAN: It's
an honor to have you in our humble firehouse studios.

WANGARI MAATHAI:
It's wonderful to be here. Thank you very much for having me.

AMY GOODMAN: I know
you're heading back to Kenya tonight. Can you go back to the moment
when you heard that you had won the Nobel Peace Prize? Where were you?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
I was on my way to my constituency, and this is something I do often
on Fridays, because for the rest of the week I'm attending Parliament
in Nairobi and attending to my ministerial duties. But on Fridays and
most of the weekends, I'm in the rural areas tending to my constituents.
So, I was actually on my way. I had a meeting there, and I also was
going to participate in the issuing of cards to the youth. So, I was
doing what I always do over the weekend.

AMY GOODMAN: So,
how did you learn? A telephone call?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
A telephone call came first from the Norwegian Ambassador in Kenya,
and he told me that I want you to keep your telephone free, because
you are going to be called within some minutes from Oslo, and they have
some news for you. And well, I thought maybe it is -- maybe it is something
that has to do with my friends. I have some very good friends in Norway
of many years, and I had some partners with whom we worked on the Green
Belt Movement for many years. So it was nothing extraordinary. I had
just then, in June of the same year, received the Sophie Prize which
is given in Norway. So, hearing from the embassy was not such a big
deal. Little did I know what was lying ahead.

AMY GOODMAN: So
what did you do? Did you immediately turn around and go back to Nairobi?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
No, I didn't, actually. I was persuaded to go back to Nairobi because
I was told that's where the press is, that's where everybody is looking
for me, but I had an appointment with my people, and they were waiting
for me, so I just got it done and went and did what I was expected to
do, but in the meantime, the President, Mr. Mwai Kibaki, was looking
for me, and he couldn't track me down. Finally, he sent a helicopter
to pick me up, take me back to Nairobi. It was wonderful. It was the
first time anything like that ever happened so, a lot of wonderful things
happened on that day.

AMY GOODMAN: We're
talking to Wangari Maathai on this International Women's Day. We'll
be back in a minute with her.

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: Our
guest is the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Wangari Maathai. She is
with us in the studio where Shirin Ebadi sat last year, the 2003 Nobel
Peace Prize winner. You are the first African woman and environmentalist
to win this prize. Can you talk about the connection between environmental
issues and peace?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
It is very important for us to recognize the historic shift that has
taken place as a result of this prize. That the Norwegian Nobel Committee
decided after almost 100 years of the prize that it is very, very important
for the world to recognize the linkage between good management of the
environment, sustainable and efficient management of our environment
and resources, and equitable distribution of these resources on one
side, and democratic space and peace. If we are going to manage our
resources sustainability, efficiently, if we are going to share them
equitably, we need democratic space. It is impossible to manage resources
responsibly and sustainably in a dictatorship, because in such a situation
you have a few people controlling the resources at the expense of the
many, and therefore, you cannot have peace. Sooner or later, you have
conflict. And when we look at many of the wars that have been fought
today and have been fought in the past, they are over resources. Whether
it is at the national level or whether it is at the group level. This
is the mind shift that the Committee is calling us to. To recognize
the linkage between these three pillars of any stable society.

AMY GOODMAN: Speaking
of war, your thoughts on the invasion and occupation of Iraq?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
Well, I really don't want to occupy myself in this war. We all know
how we got there, and we all know what has happened since, but it is
very, very important for us to recognize that the resources that are
in that country must be managed sustainably, responsibly and for the
benefit of the people of that country. They will share them with the
rest of the world, but surely, these resources must benefit the majority
of the people in that country, and that that can only happen if you
have democratic space. And this democratic space is going to have to
be built first and foremost by the people of that country within their
constraints, within their culture, within their history.

AMY GOODMAN: What
kind of effect does this war, the war in Iraq, have on Africa, have
on Kenya? Does it?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
Well, one of the impacts of this, of course, is because of the oil.
Suddenly, the oil price goes up, and for poor countries such as the
countries in Africa, this suddenly means that resources that could have
been diverted to education, to medical care, to providing drugs, are
diverted to buy oil, since many of our economies are very dependent
on that oil. And the speculation means that a lot of us have to forego
some of the very basic services because our governments are not able
to provide those services. Now, as you know, Kenya has been a victim
of terror twice, in fact, and therefore, for us, it has meant negative
impact on tourism, including countries advising their citizens not to
travel to Kenya. So, economically, the war in Iraq has a lot of impacts,
negative impact in many other parts of the world where we may not even
consider that there is any connection.

AMY GOODMAN: We're
talking to Wangari Maathai, the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize winner. You have
been traveling the world since you won the prize, and one of the places
you went was Japan, where you held a news conference in Tokyo, calling
for cancellation of debt repayments by African countries. Can you talk
about this issue?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
This issue of debt has been discussed for many years. In the year 2000,
there was a global campaign called, Jubilee 2000 Campaign, and it was
calling for the cancellation of the debts. We all know about these debts.
We all know that many of these debts were actually accumulated at a
time when there was no democracy in many of our countries, when business
was being done with dictators, people who were not responsible and accountable
to their people. The people who were doing business with them, who are
now the governments that are now demanding the repayments of these debts
knew that these were dictators, that these people were not accountable
to their people, but now sometimes after these dictators are no longer
in power, it is the ordinary people, the ordinary rural populations,
who are being punished, who are being sacrificed by their governments
so that their governments can service the debts. That's why we are saying,
really, if there is a will to assist African countries and other developing
countries, these debts should be canceled and mechanisms should be found
either to repay these monies or recover, because they're known where
they are. So, we think that  and I'm very grateful to some of
the governments, especially within G8, that are advocating that indeed
the debts should be canceled. Some countries don't pay, and those who
pay are quite often sacrificing their people, sacrificing poor people,
sacrificing sick people, sacrificing people who are unable to send their
children to school.

AMY GOODMAN: Would
you recommend that countries simply don't pay the debt?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
Well, I know some people have said, Why do these people bother?
Why do they sacrifice their people, even though they know the facts
on the ground? Now we know that many of these countries that are
demanding the payments of debts are in a position to greatly punish
any country that refuses to pay those debts, to service those debts,
and that, Im sure, is the reason why many of our governments continue
to sacrifice their people, because the punishment that they could get
would be greater, and it would have even a greater impact on their people.
Punishments such as having the markets completely closed, refusing to
provide any aid, refusing to do any trade. So, I think that its
a very unfair system that we are facing in the world today, and it's
a system where in all aspects the might is right and can do whatever
it does -- it want to do, because the weak are too weak to refuse to
punish itself.

AMY GOODMAN: Wangari
Maathai, can you talk about how you founded the Green Belt Movement?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
Well, almost 30 years ago now as we were preparing to go to Mexico to
the very first United Nations Conference on Women, the conference that
declared the Women's Decade in Mexico, we were discussing at the national
level under the umbrella of the National Council of Women of Kenya,
and here women from all different sectors came and met around the table.
And as we talked, I listened to the women from the rural areas, and
I noticed that the issues that they were raising had something to do
with the land. They were asking for firewood. They said they needed
firewood. They needed energy, which is their main sources of energy.
They needed clean drinking water. They needed food. They needed income,
because they were poor.

And I recognized
the linkage between their problems and the environment, which was degraded
and was not able to sustain them. And so, perhaps because of my biological
background, because I did my studies in biology, in ecology, I immediately
understood that what we really needed to address those problems is to
rehabilitate the environment. I did not go to Mexico, but I stayed home
and immediately started encouraging women that we plant trees. That's
how it all started. But as I went deeper into that exercise, I started
to see a labyrinth, a labyrinth of problems, linkages of problems in
other sectors, such as governance. Governance became a very important
cause or root cause of environmental degradation. Bad governance, misgovernance,
logging, deforestation, allowing soil erosion, irresponsible management
of these resources by the government. And that is why eventually the
movement started the campaign for the greater democratic space and became
eventually a joint -- eventually, the pro-democracy movement in Kenya.

AMY GOODMAN: Can
you talk about why more than ten years ago, you stripped naked with
other women in the streets of downtown Nairobi?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
I should say, I personally did not want to strip naked, but some of
my colleagues did, and the reason was that particular incident was an
incident where in the course of many years people, young people, especially
young men, who were trying to reintroduce a multiparty political system
in the country, who were advocating for greater democratic space, had
systematically been picked and thrown into jail. Many of them had been
tortured in torture chambers that had been created in a building that
was immediately opposite where we had camped. The building is called
Nyayo House. And the mothers of those sons came to me and asked me if
I could join them to demand the release of their sons. That was in 1991,
towards the end of 1991, when the multiparty system was reintroduced,
and as a result, there was no good reason where all of those people,
all of those young men who had been jailed because of their political
activities, should have been in. And so I joined them and I became like
their interpreter.

We went to the government,
went to the Attorney General, the Honorable Amos Waku, and we told him,
now that we have reintroduced the multiparty system, now that you have
said that it's okay to advocate for greater democratic space, all of
these sons -- there were about 52 of them at that time that we knew
of -- should be released. We requested him to do so, to facilitate.
We went to this park, which is the Freedom Park, Uhuru Park in Nairobi,
in one little corner, opposite that building, and we camped there to
wait for the sons. And it was while we were there that a lot of people
came to that site, and they started giving witnesses of how they had
been arrested, sometimes on trumped-up charges, sometimes due to misunderstanding,
how they had been taken to those chambers, how they had been tortured,
and men were crying tears because of the experience they had gone through.
And that was the very first time that people had found space to talk
about their persecution, to talk about the oppression of that government.
I think that we just threatened that government to its roots, because
for the first time we had created space for people to talk about how
their rights had been violated.

AMY GOODMAN: And
the significance of undressing?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
The significance of undressing was that when the government unleashed
its terror on us, and the people who were with us there, several hundreds
of them on that day, the women in the traditional African demonstration
of anger and frustration by women, when women are confronted, punished,
threatened by men who are old enough to be their sons, that's extremely
humiliating, because whatever you do as a man, you must not touch your
mother. You cannot beat your mother. You cannot hurt your mother. So,
what these women were doing to these soldiers is to tell them, I curse
you as my son for the way you are treating me, and I'm your mother.
That's what these women -- that's what the statement really is, that
some women stripped naked, other women can shake their breasts. It's
a way of telling young men that you have violated one of the most sacred
codes, that you never touch your mother.

AMY GOODMAN: Wangari
Maathai, you led a one-woman charge against Daniel arap Moi's autocratic
regime after he proposed building the tallest skyscraper in Africa,
and a six-story statue of himself in the only public green space in
Kenya's capital. He called you a mad woman. He called you a threat to
the order and security of the country. Ultimately, you prevailed.

WANGARI MAATHAI:
Well, all of this is part of the misgovernance that I'm talking about,
the fact that here is a public park, the only huge public park that
is available to the members of the public. It is a beehive over the
weekends especially, because that's where most people from lower-income
areas escape with their families. The ruling party at that time, at
a time when it felt very, very powerful, like nobody could touch it,
decided to build this tower and to take over the park. All I did was
tell the ruling party that this is completely unacceptable. This is
a park that is very, very important. It's a green space. Every city
needs green spaces. Every city needs trees. Every city needs a space
where people can rest without being asked questions and without being
perceived as if they're intruding, because they, too, need space. Space
is a human right. You need space, and so I campaigned to have that space
protected, and fortunately for me, there were also a lot of networks,
especially in other parts of the world, including here in America. People
who went to their governments and who requested an explanation as to
why our government was being supported to destroy a green space in the
city and why our government was being supported when the people themselves
don't want it.

Now this, again,
was the very first time that citizens had managed to raise their voices
to demand their environmental rights and to say that this building,
they do not want. And for the donors, for the very first time for the
donors to listen to the voice of the people. Because sometimes donors
don't pay any attention to the people, to the local people. They're
so busy doing business with the leaders. So even if the leaders are
very oppressive, they're very dictatorial, the donors will just go ahead
and do business. Now this was the first time that the donors said, Well,
I guess Kenyans have spoken. And so, they withdrew their support.

AMY GOODMAN: The
investors?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
Yeah, the investors. That more than perhaps my yelling and shouting
saved the park.

AMY GOODMAN: We're
talking to Wangari Maathai. We go to break and then come back. And,
finally, we'll be joined by her daughter, as well.

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: Our
guest is Wangari Maathai, the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize winner. In a few
minutes, we're going to talk with her daughter as well, who has joined
us, and joined us soon after the announcement was made of the award
to her mother. But before we do that, Wangari, I wanted to ask you about
the issue of AIDS. It was announced on Friday, the U.N. warning another
89 million people in Africa could be infected by the HIV virus over
the next 20 years. The U.N. described AIDS as the continent's biggest
crisis since slavery, some 25 million people in sub-Saharan Africa already
living with HIV and AIDS. Now, you have said, Some say AIDS came
from monkeys. I doubt that, because weve been living with monkeys
since time immemorial. Others say it was a curse from God, but I say
it cannot be that. And youve talked about it being from
evil men. Can you talk about your thoughts on AIDS?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
Well, I would like to say that I never said that it was an agent created
to destroy the black people. That, I don't know where it came from.
And I have stated quite clearly that I didn't say that, and I don't
believe it. I am not an expert on AIDS. I don't even know where it came
from, and I'm waiting like everybody else to be guided by the scientists
who I know are working very hard not only to understand it, but also
to save humanity, which is facing this disease. And, obviously, in my
part of the world, it is, as you have read, a devastating disease, partly
because it's finding people who are -- who have their cultural practices
have been destroyed. It is finding people who are very uninformed. It
is finding people who in many ways may be malnourished and therefore
their immune system is very poor. It is finding people who are poor,
and therefore, unable to even access the drugs that are available. So,
for us members of parliament weve been held responsible to go
to the villages and educate and urge our people to understand the grave
impact of this disease, and to try to protect themselves, and to protect
each other. And those who are interested in my position on this can
log on my website, WangariMaathai.org, and you see my position on this.
I think that I also want to take this opportunity to urge companies
that have drugs, that can make drugs available, to really assist our
governments so that more and more people, especially in the rural areas,
those who are known to make less than $1 a day, and medicine is still
more than that per day, to do something to reduce the price of these
drugs so that more and more of our people can access the drugs. That
is what is important at this time, as our scientists continue to work
on the disease.

AMY GOODMAN: Do
you feel many feel that it is a biological agent that was unleashed
to destroy black people in Africa?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
I don't know of anyone who really believes that. I don't know of anyone
who believes that. Most of us don't know. And part of the responsibility
that we have is to educate people so that they are not given misinformation,
and there is a lot of misinformation that goes around about the disease,
as you know.

AMY GOODMAN: On
the issue of the Kyoto Protocol: In Japan, where you just were, in Kyoto,
you called on nations who are holding out to sign the Kyoto Protocol.
What would you say to President Bush, who has unsigned that treaty?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
Well, I have been under a lot of pressure to make a statement about
especially the United States because, of course, the United States is
the leader of the world today in many ways. It is the superpower. It
provides leadership that a lot of people look up to, and what the United
States decides does have a great impact on the rest of the world. And
so, when it doesn't sign the Kyoto Protocol, a lot of people raise their
voices. But I have been saying that whatever the reasons are that the
President has for not subscribing to the Kyoto Protocol, I want to recognize
the millions of Americans, both at the individual level, at community
level, even at municipality level, and even among companies who are
doing a lot to address the issues of climate change; and I really believe
that eventually it is these citizens who are going to ask the government
to change its position or to negotiate a protocol that is truly in support
of what the rest of the world is advocating for. And I would rather
really engage these citizens, thank them, encourage them, and ask them
to work on their government to change its position, and to understand
that for a country that consumes so much fossil fuels, produces so much
of greenhouse gases, it cannot afford to leave the rest of the world
to deal with the climate change.

AMY GOODMAN: We're
talking to Wangari Maathai, Nobel Peace Prize winner, 2004. We are also
joined in the studio by Wanjira Maathai, the daughter of Wangari (the
only daughter, she also has two sons), international liaison for the
Green Belt Movement of Kenya, a rising figure in Kenyan and international
environmental women's politics in the world. How did you raise your
daughter? What was your philosophy?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
Well, I must say that in many ways, Im very grateful for the way
that this young lady has turned out, because when I started my campaign
some 30 years ago, they were just kids. They were small. They did not
really have understand what mom was involved in, why she was involved
in that. And as they were growing up, I was always concerned because
I didn't know how they were processing the information about jails,
about beatings, about harassment, because as a parent, and as all of
us, most of us who are involved in activism in trying to improve our
communities, we do it because that's our time to do it, but we are at
the same time raising the next generation. And I can only say that I
hope that as we do what we need to do or what we must do, that we do
it with a consciousness that we are raising the next generation, and
that the next generation is looking at us and is evaluating whether
they should adopt or whether they should abandon what we are doing.

AMY GOODMAN: Wanjira,
what was it like to see your mother beaten, for your mother to be jailed?
What was it like for a little girl in Kenya?

WANJIRA MAATHAI:
It was difficult, especially the initial times, when I  I think,
probably in the late 1980s is when I really started to understand that
something is really wrong, you know, it doesn't make sense. I used to
ask a lot of questions, and I used to get answers. You know, I used
to -- My mother would explain to me that, you know, when you do something
wrong or when you let -- you don't have to wait for everybody to help
you solve this problem. If you see that it's wrong and you believe that
it's the right thing to do, do something about it. So, I always knew
that what she was doing was probably going against the grain, and that
--not always very popular, especially with government. I was always
very afraid. I always feared that something would happen to her. But
I always had a part of me that believed that maybe she's lucky. Something
-- she's protected, because she always did come back, and she always
made it through some very difficult situations. So, in a way, I came
up with a coping mechanism of saying that nothing will happen, and I
refused to believe that something would.

AMY GOODMAN: It's
International Working Women's Day, and this is something that so many
working women struggle with, also, is simply being away from their children.
How did you deal with that? How did you find the balance of being a
role model out there in the world, but being there for your kids, not
just them watching you on television?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
Well, fortunately, I was able to go back home and be with them, and
when they grew up later, and even came to the United States to study,
thank God for telephones, and that I could call them, and I could reach
them. And occasionally, I would have an opportunity to travel to this
country, and I would be able to be in touch with them. It is not as
if there was any deliberate plan that, now I must stop this campaign
and rush home and be with the children. It was a way of life. You're
struggling on one side, you're struggling; on the other hand, you know
that you have children that have to be fed and have to be put to bed,
and their homework has to be looked at, and somehow you cope. You don't
always cope very well. I must say that sometimes you are under a lot
of pressure, and you doubt yourself, and sometimes you look at them
and you look at their innocent eyes and you wonder, will they be alright?
And it is not as if I knew that I would come out alright, and that there
would never be -- I would never have a problem. There were situations
where my life was literally threatened, but it also so happens that
when you are committed to a cause, so many people less lucky than myself
have lost their lives, even environmentalists have lost their lives.
The Brazilian, I'm trying to remember his name --

AMY GOODMAN: Chico
Mendes?

WANGARI MAATHAI:
Chico Mendes, who was killed because of his activities in trying to
save the Amazon. Recently Ken Saro-Wiwa in Nigeria. So a lot of our
colleagues have lost their lives, have been maimed. And I'm lucky, and
I thank God. And I also want to say at this time that I have been emphasizing
that, although this prize came to me, and although I'm the one who is
receiving all the glory and all the accolades, this is really a recognition
for all of us, and I hope that we as environmentalists and people who
have worked for democratic principles who have pushed the democracy
movement, who have been fighting for peace movements, who have been
in the women's movement, to recognize that it is all of us together,
all of this huge constituency of civil society that has been recognized
by the Norwegian Nobel Committee. And the Committee has said, These
are the people who are shaping what should be the next state of the
world. That this is the future. This is where the future is, and these
are the people that we want people to focus on, and to see what they're
doing, and to embrace what they're doing. So, I'm hoping that
all of this huge constituency is feeling proud, is feeling encouraged,
is feeling that it is recognized, that we can walk tall. A day like
this for women to feel good as women, to feel that even though quite
often we are not recognized, we struggle, we are ridiculed, we are abandoned,
we are sometimes put aside -- even when we are the most competent at
work, we find ourselves being pushed aside -- that we can feel proud
and very confident and walk tall on a day like this.

AMY GOODMAN: And
the Green Belt Movement in Nigeria, where does it go from here? For
both of you, I ask, and we only have a few seconds.

WANGARI MAATHAI:
In Kenya, the Green Belt Movement is actually headquartered in Kenya,
and we are trying very hard to not only intensify our work in Kenya,
but also in the rest of Africa, and indeed beyond. And part of what
I'm trying to do also is fundraise so that we can respond to the enormous
response that we have received from all over the world, especially since
we received the prize.

AMY GOODMAN: And
Wanjira, will you be a part -- continue to be a part of it?

AMY GOODMAN: I want
to thank you both very much for being with us. Wangari Maathai, 2004
Nobel Peace Prize Laureate will be giving her only address in New York
before leaving for Kenya tonight at Cooper Union, tonight at 7:00. And
Wanjira Maathai, thanks so much for being with us, as well.